


The Power of Ten

by Gilli_ann



Category: Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Humor, Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-11
Updated: 2013-10-11
Packaged: 2017-12-29 03:33:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1000378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gilli_ann/pseuds/Gilli_ann
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack tells Ennis that he “had to ask about ten different people in Riverton where you was livin’.”  Who were those ten people, exactly, and could their meeting with Jack possibly have impacted them – and made them in turn impact Ennis - so that fate turned out differently? This fic looks at that possibility and Ennis’s related trials and tribulations in a slightly tongue-in-cheek way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Power of Ten

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** Jack, Ennis and Brokeback Mountain belong to Annie Proulx, Diana Ossana, Larry McMurtry and Focus Features. I intend no disrespect nor copyright infringement, and I make no profit from this.
> 
> This story is not to be copied from AO3 or used elsewhere by anyone for any reason without my explicit written permission.

**The Power of Ten**

   
**Weekend with the girls**  
   
Ever after that weekend, Ennis was unable to muster any clear recollection of what he and the girls had done together. He knew he was taking them into town for burgers and ice cream when Jack showed up, so that’s probably what they did.  
   
They’d talked some of going to a movie, too – “Jaws” was showing and the girls had been pestering him a lot to be allowed to see it. Their mom obviously had told them a firm “no”.  
   
He always felt a terrible pain and despair clench his heart when anyone as much as mentioned “Jaws” in later years, so probably they did actually go see it. He wasn’t quite sure. He vaguely recalled some shrieking and hollering, and both a the girls hanging on to his arms for dear life. He couldn’t remember much about it. If they did go see it, whatever happened in the famous shark film made no impression on him.  
   
All he could sense and all he could see was Jack’s pale incredulous look of complete and utter disappointment.   
   
Well, the girls and he sure must have done something, anyhow, and he must have managed a half-assed reasonable daddy act, for his daughters seemed very happy and thrilled with the weekend. But then, they saw him so rarely, maybe they figured divorced daddies were supposed to be completely out of it, distracted and tense. Zombies with money to spend.  
   
Once he’d dropped the girls off back at Alma’s, he got himself home and made friends with the whiskey bottle he kept for special occasions. This was a special occasion, he figured. He hadn’t felt this desperately down since Jack drove past him and disappeared down the dusty road in Signal those many years ago.  
   
Just like back then, he felt like puking. He’d a liked to just quietly pass out.  
   
Damn. Jack’s eyes kept haunting him… the delight that turned to dull and bleak despair, the light that went out as he realized Ennis couldn’t… wouldn’t…. was too afraid to……  
   
Ennis pulled on his bottle and punched the wall a couple a times. It hurt like hell, but hardly managed to dull his miserable feeling of despair. Why couldn’t Jack let be? How could he not know it was impossible? Impossible! Two guys livin’ together, no way, NO WAY.  
   
He cursed and kicked a chair across the floor, moving restlessly about in the small and pitiful room that served him as a kitchen. A desperate lion in a cage, endlessly pacing, going nowhere.  
   
Eventually complete stupor set in and he fell into bed, exhausted, drunk and nearly dead to the world.  
   
But even so, he could still hear Jack’s pleading, desperate “Ennis!” whispered like a sad soft echo repeating itself in his head.  
 

   
**The Boss**  
   
Somehow Ennis managed to crawl out of bed and get going the next morning, just as early as ever. He felt more dead than alive, and probably looked no better.  
   
He knew he shouldn’t be driving in this state, but couldn’t manage to give a shit.  
   
He got behind the wheel and drove on.  
   
It was a quiet day at the ranch. Winter feeding coming up soon, some repair work was going on around the out-buildings, and Ennis volunteered for going over the home pasture lean-tos, replacing rotten or broken planks, making them ready for winter season.  
   
He ducked his head and squinted through slit eyes as he walked with heavy steps across the yard, avoiding the painfully harsh glare of the bright new day as best he could.  
   
Another bleak day without Jack.  
   
All day long he shifted heavy planks, getting the old out of the way, hammering the new ones into place. Each blow of the hammer reverberated though his skull like someone was doing their utmost to cleave his brain with an axe. He figured he probably deserved it, could hardly distinguish the pain in his head from the one in his heart anyway. At any rate it sure kept him from thinking, so he figured it was for the best.  
   
Inevitably he sobered up as the hours passed, much as he would have liked the world to remain blurry and indistinct.  
   
By the end of the day, as he returned to check in with the boss, he was weary in body, heart and mind. But his head had cleared despite his best efforts to make it explode.  
   
Boss Jansen heard him out about the work done without much comment, only had a couple a questions about the fixing and mending that still remained to be done. He knew Ennis could pull his weight. Didn’t need no coddling.  
   
The reporting out a the way, he asked Ennis to stop by the feed store on his way home to pick up some new mineral formula he was gonna try out on the stock. He’d just had word the tubs were ready to be collected. Pick’em up today, bring ‘em over tomorrow.  
   
Ennis nodded in ready agreement.  
   
Fine. Sure thing. No problem. Not a one. Except for his skull still feeling too tight and way too small for his aching brain. And his chest feeling much too small for all the pain in his heart.  
   
Just as Ennis was stepping out of the office, a thought struck Boss Jansen.  
   
“By the way, del Mar, a friend a yours drove up here on Saturday. Never seen him before. Was drivin’  a Ford, a fine new blue ‘n white F160, and he had the biggest and happiest grin I ever saw on a grown man in my life. Was looking for you.”  
   
Ennis winced in horrified disbelief. Jack had come here, the fool? God damn it! He nearly slapped both hands to his forehead to keep his skull from exploding at last.  
   
Mr. Jansen continued right on talking, evidently oblivious to Ennis’s discomfort. After all, he had long since gotten used to Ennis squinting and mumbling and looking like he wanted to sink into the ground.  
   
“Yeah, friend a yours, so he said. Knew you worked here, at any rate. Told him you live out St. Stephens way, but come to think a it, you never told us exactly where. Offered to open the office and see if I could find a new address on you.”  
   
He stopped his tale of the smiling stranger to give voice to another train of though.  
   
“You have left notice with Marv ‘bout where you’re staying now, haven’t you? You know it’s mandatory and we need it.”  
   
“Yes,” Ennis muttered listlessly. “I mean no. I mean, I know. Haven’t gotten around to it yet. Sorry.”  
   
His headache sure had risen from the dead with a vengeance now, and was giving it another, even more intense go.  
   
Boss Jansen nodded.  
   
“Well, you’ve had a lot on your mind. Can see that. Stop by Marv tomorrow and let him have it.”  
   
Mr. Jansen shook his head, dismissing the annoying paperwork till another day. He wasn’t much for all those forms and columns and signatures and duplicates himself.  
   
“Good thing I didn’t go search for it in vain, huh? But your friend couldn’t wait for any search, anyhow. He just wanted to be off, was practically skippin’ on  his feet, was in a real hurry, said he’d find you sure enough, was right cheerful about it too, so I never got to try to dig it out for him. He find you?”  
   
“Yes,” Ennis muttered again.  
   
He felt he had to give the boss something to go on after Jack’d made a display of himself and his eager longing to get hold of his friend Ennis, so he added a listless;  “Has been a bud a mine for many years.”  
   
He and Jack had been seen together, after all. No use denying it. Damn that man – his man – his only man, for ever and always - and his irresponsible lack of fear and caution!  
   
“Well, he looked like a fine fellow,” the boss said approvingly. “Hope ya’ll had some good times over the weekend. Truth be told, you sure look like you’ve been tasting more’n a drop of liquor, del Mar.”  
   
He let a small grin show.  
   
“Doesn’t feel so good now with the hangover and all, huh? But I bet it was worth it. Good to know you’ve been havin’ a fine time with a buddy. Figure you needed to lighten up a bit, what with all the troubles lately. ”  
   
The boss was thinking of the divorce, Ennis reckoned. None a his business, but he meant to be kind. Wasn’t easy for folks to deal with guys whose wives left them to get hitched to well-off grocers the very next day, – or near enough.  
   
Ducking his head, Ennis edged towards the door, mumbled something, pulled the hat further down over his eyes, said his good-days and nearly ran out a there.  
   
He lumbered hurriedly for his truck, the unforgiving light of the now-waning day stabbing at him accusingly. 

 

 **The cheerleaders**  
   
On the parking lot out back, next to where Ennis had parked his truck, Susan Jansen was loitering, her friend Lila in tow. The girls had barely turned 16, far as Ennis knew, but were dressing as if they were grown-up womenfolk, and not very respectable ones.  
   
He nodded in their direction curtly, his sinister glare hidden under his hat brim, and hurried on by.  
   
None a his business that the boss let his daughter go outside displaying herself to every man who cared to ogle her merchandise. Girl had no shame, looking like that. If Junior or Jenny were to try anything similar at Susan’s age, he’d give them a talking to they wouldn’t soon forget. Alma would too. That would be one time when his ex-wife and he would see eye to eye, one hundred percent.  
   
The two girls were whispering together, nudging each other, and one a them giggled. Ennis shuddered slightly, feeling the usual fear-born anger rise hot in his chest, washing red over his face and his vision.  
   
Giggles behind his back, knowing that people were pointing and staring, that was his very worst nightmare. He wasn’t in no mood to tolerate or handle it now. He lowered his head even more, hard as it was to manage that and to still stay upright. Jaws clenched so hard they hurt, pretending not to notice nothing, he tore open the door of his truck and was about to throw himself inside. Saved!  
   
“Mr. del Mar?” Susan said clearly, stepping closer.  
   
He stopped short. She was the daughter of the boss. He couldn’t just ignore her, however much he wanted to. Shoulders sagging, he turned his head a fraction.  
   
“Hunh?”  
   
She stared at him insistently. “Mr. del Mar, did your friend find you?”  
   
He looked back at her, shocked. These two little gals know about Jack too?  
   
“We met a friend a yours on the road just outside a here. Stopped to ask the way. On Saturday that was. We was waiting for Jim to pick us up, planning on goin’ into town.”  
   
Jim was her boyfriend. In Ennis’s opinion, the boy came close to taking the prize for being the most worthless lay-about he’d ever seen in his life. But he did have a car, and a good one at that, thanks to his father’s money. Guess that was what Susan saw in him. That, and the big fancy mullet.  
   
It was Lila’s turn to pipe up. “Yeah, he stopped and asked if we pretty ladies knew Junior Del Mar by any chance, said he was a friend a her daddy’s and looking for his new place, asked directions.”  
   
She squirmed and chirped inanely. “Pretty ladies! And he meant it too! Said he could see right away that we surely had to be cheerleaders!”  
   
She giggled louder. The sound scraped painfully along every raw nerve in Ennis’s body.  
   
Susan wasn’t about to be outdone by her simpering friend, and took the initiative firmly back with a torrent of words.  
   
“You know, we don’t know where you live, exactly, but I told him where you used to be, and I told him we know who Junior is and Jenny too, even if they are just kids. I told him, but he already knew that, and we even offered to help him look for you, you know, but he said our daddies wouldn’t like that for sure and I guess he was right…”  
   
Lila giggled again, and louder.  
   
Susan gave her a look and continued right on without drawing as much as a breath.  
   
“…. But we wondered who your friend is, because he was really good-looking and he had very stylish clothes on, you know. He looked so cool! You don’t often see cowboys who know how to dress around here. He really is a friend a yours?”  
   
If Ennis had valued her judgment at all, he wouldn’t a cared much for her skeptical air and her disbelieving tone in uttering that last question.  
   
What, Jack looked too good for him? So fine and dandy and well-dressed, he had little floosies swooning left and right, did he?  
   
Ennis realized he was grinding his teeth. Before he could somehow unclench his jaws, Susan continued.  
   
“I hope he found you, though, that would be nice. And anyway, will he be stayin’ around here? He seemed really charmin’ and those eyes… they were so bright and fine and so…. incredibly blue! Like the summer sky, or something! And oh, I’d kill for lashes like that! It’s so not fair that a man looks like that!”  
   
She shook her head in wonder.  
   
“I’m sure he’s a really fab dancer, too, and Lila and I thought  - well, you know – we thought…. If he’s gonna be around here anyway….. there’s not much to do on weekends, so…”  
   
She faltered at long last, as Ennis’s darkly furious frown and obviously disapproving silence finally got to her.  
   
“Yeah, he came by my place,” he grated. “But he’s already gone and he’s not comin’ back neither.”  
   
He stared at her pointedly. “None a my business, Susan, but you know you shouldn’t talk like that to strange men you meet on the road. You’re too young, girl. I’m sure your dad would agree.”  
   
She grimaced and sighed, the lipstick-heavy mouth turning into a perfect red pretzel, twisted in a pout of displeasure. But she evidently thought there was no use in regaling him with a comeback or an excuse, now that Jack wouldn’t be around anyhow.  
   
She shrugged. Lila immediately mirrored her. They exchanged exasperated glances, plucked eyebrows shooting up, eyes rolling skyward in perfect unison, and finally they stepped back, out of his way.  
   
Ennis nodded at them briefly and got into the truck at last.  
   
Inwardly he was cursing Jack soundly for giving the girls someone to gossip about, something to speculate about, a certain someone to moon over and pant over and caress in their minds… like love-struck little bimbos!  
   
They had no business going on about Jack’s fine blue eyes. Those beautiful eyes were cheapened by such ignorant praise.  
   
Ennis sighed heavily. He guessed it would be a while before Jack’s eyes would be shining with joy again. The light had seemed to go completely out of them, right there in front of Ennis. Only two days ago.  
   
And even though Ennis had had to inflict such pain on Jack – he had to do it, he had to, was protecting the both a them, dammit!– here were these silly shallow cheerleaders, gossiping away about Jack. About Jack and him.  
   
Hell, who knew what ideas they could manage to come up with if they just chattered on long enough?  
   
He shuddered.  
   
He couldn’t get away fast enough.  
   
He stepped on it too violently, all four tires spitting mud and gravel as he shot out of the parking lot like a bullet exploding from a gun. The two girls had to scramble in the most undignified way to avoid being sprayed with dirt.  
   
In Ennis’s honest opinion just there and then, all the mud of the world could only mean an improvement where those two were concerned.  
   
He hadn’t meant to do it, though, and felt really bad about it when he caught their frantic capering in the mirror.  
   
But maybe it was for the best. That’d teach them to do their giggly snooping far from him in future. And to stop thinking about Jack, all lovesick and dreamy and romantic like. Because… shit. That was no-one’s business but his, and his alone, goddamn it!  
   
 

 **The post office manager**  
   
Speeding down the bumpy road soon enough shook some sense back into him. He couldn’t go straight home and hide, however much he wanted to.  
   
For one thing, there were those formula tubs to pick up. And in addition he’d figured out that he needed to go by the post office. He hadn’t picked up his mail in a week – and what if there was something from Jack there? What if Jack had left him a message, or sent him advance warning or something - and he never even knew? He couldn’t risk not going to find out.  
   
He made the post office his first stop of the day. Best to get it over with.  
   
Before walking in there he had to stop and steel himself. It might look just like an ordinary post office, but he knew it for the lion’s den it was. Or rather, the lioness’s den.  
   
Pity the hat couldn’t go further down over his face, but he’d walk blindfold if he tried.  
   
He squared his shoulders, drew a deep breath and opened the door.  
   
Of course she had to be there. Mrs. Cooper always was. And of course she spotted him. The nosiest, most relentlessly inquisitive post office manager in the State a Wyoming.  
   
“Ennis del Mar! I’ve been wondering when you’d stop by!” she announced in her normal speaking voice, which could easily be heard over in Laramie. Now it hit his aching head like a hammer hits the anvil.  
   
“Please come over here for a moment, would ya, dear?”  
   
He couldn’t refuse. It would be rude, and she’d probably keep right on talking in that same voice if he did, to the entertainment of all other customers and the rest a the town as well.  
   
Somehow, he knew what was coming, so he wasn’t surprised when she launched into a tale of how this fine young man had come in the other day, inquiring about Ennis del Mar’s whereabouts, a man who presented himself as (and here she consulted a small paper slip) Jack Twist.  
   
Looking back up piercingly, she went on to explain, still too loudly and at great length, how she’d offered to give this Mr. Twist directions to Alma’s, since Ennis inexplicably and inexcusably had failed to let her know exactly where he’d moved to after the divorce, what with getting his mail collect and all, even though she did know it was over on the south side, because Mrs. Larson had been kind enough to tell her as much.  
   
Ennis thought he detected more than a hint of suspicion and distaste in her voice. He hoped it was because he’d not told her where he lived, and not because she guessed the truth. If she did, he’d be done for.  
   
Mrs. Cooper went right on, her piercing eyes never leaving him for a moment.  
   
“Mr. Twist didn’t want to inconvenience dear Alma - Mrs. Monroe, I should say - even though I pointed out to him that she surely would be able to give him her ex-husband’s address.”  
   
She frowned.  
   
“Now, I myself thought he might have wanted to look in on Alma anyhow, if he was a friend a the both a you. But perhaps he specifically came to see you? Don’t I distinctly seem to recall his name from a postcard or two, something to do with fishin’ trips? I’m sure I do, now that I’ve had time to think about it. But perhaps Mr. Twist was looking for you in order to conduct some sort of business? He did tell me he'd had connections with you for a long time.”  
   
Ennis couldn’t possibly get a word in edgewise, not that he wanted to. He was torn between fear, embarrassment and rage – the latter directed at Jack. Why couldn’t the crazy son of a bitch be more circumspect? This woman was sharp and dangerous, she might soon enough lead the town in a procession to tar and feather them, pitchforks and tire irons at the ready, if she ever even suspected the truth of those fishing trip connections….  
   
He desperately wanted to bite his nails, his fingers twitching nervously. His head took hurt to a new dimension.  
   
Finally having exhausted her tale, Mrs. Cooper drew breath. Her eyes bored into him. She was glaring, obviously ready for a dramatic grande finale of a closing statement.  
   
“One final thing, Mr. del Mar. You’ve actually been keeping him a secret, haven’t you? How unconscionable! Tell me…… “  
   
Ennis waited mutely for the axe to fall.  
   
“Why didn’t you let anyone know your fishin’ buddy is such a very decent and upright and polite and pleasant young man?”  
   
Her seemingly disapproving, strict and suspicious face broke into a big smile displaying slightly yellowish fangs, at war with her oddly tender expression.  
   
“Most attentive to my advice, he was, and so grateful for my suggestions! Even if he did mention he was in quite a hurry. And such a sweet and honest face on him, almost like an angel of the Lord’s!”  
   
A hint of a blush tinged her pinched cheekbones.  
   
“I imagine a real gentleman would look just like that.”  
   
She exhaled forcefully.  
   
“I can’t believe this was news to me, Ennis del Mar! The least you can do is tell me whether he’ll be passing through Riverton again? Will he be in more direct need of our post office services in the future? I certainly do hope so!”  
   
Her eyes bored into him, accusingly, but with a distinct gleam of something else. For the briefest moment they held a look that Ennis on occasion would catch a fleeting glimpse of in his own bathroom mirror, on those mornings when he happened to wake up with his mind suffused with the pleasure of a good dream about Jack. About Jack and him, together.  
   
That soft, slightly dreamy expression seemed out of place and eerie on her sharp features and behind those glasses that always would send such sinister and scrutinizing glints in Ennis’s direction.  
   
And in the next moment, sure enough - the look was gone, once more replaced with her usual no-nonsense expression.  
   
Ennis decided his aching head had to be playing tricks on him, screwing his poor eyesight all to hell. He’d better get a move on before he started seeing weirder shit, like magic little cowboy elves line-dancing on the dust motes in the post office air.  
   
Somehow he’d been saved from her realizing the truth. That was all he needed to know. Somehow Jack had thrown her off the scent. Somehow his man’s open smile and pleasing charm had lured her bloodhound instincts all astray, convincing her she was sniffing nothing but violets and roses.  
   
He slumped a little with grateful relief, and managed to mumble an apology and a brief answer about him and Jack working together, long time ago. Going fishing a few times, sure enough.  
   
Hopefully he didn’t say too much about anything, but she’d be mulling it over for a long time all the same.  
   
Finally he managed to escape, mail crumpled in a convulsively clenched fist. There wasn’t no card or message from Jack there, just a saddle catalog and a couple a stupid fliers.  
   
He’d gone through the whole ordeal in vain.

 

   
**The ex- landlord**  
   
Ennis was sweating, and little wonder. He stopped for a second out on the pavement to draw a slightly shaking arm across his aching forehead.  
   
At that very moment he heard a friendly voice right behind him.  
   
“Ennis - Ennis del Mar! Well, howdy there!”  
   
Never had Ennis felt more like running, but he knew it was too late. He turned to face Chuck Ferguson, the laundromat building proprietor. Good honest man, no nonsense, no fuss. But right now, Ennis wouldn’t have thought the Archangel Gabriel himself anywhere near proper or nice, if that meant he had to stop and talk with him.  
   
“How’s it goin’, del Mar? You copin’ on your own so far?”  
   
Ennis muttered a hello and an affirmation. Things going well enough with him. Doing perfectly OK, oh yes.  
   
Mr. Ferguson was earnestly pleased.  
   
“Great! That’s good to know. We sure were sorry ‘bout you and Alma splittin’ up. None a our business, of course.”  
   
He shrugged, clearly uncomfortable at having mentioned such a personal matter, and eager to move on to safer ground.  
   
Unknowingly he threw Ennis right from the frying pan into the fire.  
   
“By the way, Laura ran into that visitin’ friend a yours the other day, while she was waitin’ for me in the car. Stopped to ask directions to your new place, he did, and she couldn’t tell him. Was distressed about that, because this guy was so polite, she said. Seems he had the softest, sweetest, most pleasing voice she’d ever heard from a grown man.”  
   
He shrugged again, a little embarrassed at this sort a soft talk.  
   
“Yeah, you’d think he was some famous country crooner to hear her talkin’ of it. One a those guys who whispers slo-o-ow songs about love and loss and lonely hearts to make all the ladies misty-eyed. Guess I should be jealous, hahah, if she wasn’t way too old for all that. Women!”  
   
He smiled fondly. The Fergusons were well known around town to be one a those married couples who’d just grown closer and more comfortable over the years.  
   
“She’s been goin’ on about him, keeps sayin’ it’s real good to know you’ve got a nice friend like that come visitin’. Right cheerful guy too, the way she describes him?”  
   
Ennis cast a furtive glance in the direction of his truck. He considered just running for it.  
   
Seemed Jack hadn’t been kidding when he said he’d asked a lot of people about Ennis’s place. But he’d failed to mention that he’d taken the time to tell them whole chapters a his life story and to charm them all into the ground. Damn the man and his too-many talents!  
   
Ennis felt like he was being shunted matter-of-factly to the back of a long line of outspoken Jack Twist-admirers. It was confusing.  
   
Mr. Ferguson continued right on, oblivious to Ennis’s discomfort.  
   
“Well, Laura was relieved when we noticed he’d found your place anyway, later on, when we took a short cut by your place to go to our daughter Sissy’s out past Seventeen Mile. Saw the two a you there talkin’ as we drove by, and….. come to think of it, don’t think I’ve shown you my new car, have I? It’s a good one. Lots of value for the money. The missus was pleased with the color, too.”  
   
He proudly pointed out a white car parked right down the street.  
   
Ennis felt his heart take a dizzying plunge.  
   
Yes, he’d seen that car before, sure enough. He’d probably never forget seeing it. And Jack probably wouldn’t ever forget Ennis seeing it either, if the happiness dropping right off his face was anything to go by.  
   
Ennis bit his lip and shuffled his feet at the too-vivid memory. It hurt like hell.  
   
But he’d been right to be cautious! Wasn’t Chuck Ferguson standing right here, confirming that someone he knew had actually seen him and Jack together?  
   
Not that the Fergusons seemed to think there was anything unusual about that. They’d just been happy to see Jack visit! Well, anyone else passing by might have been less blind, might still have caught on. And even Ferguson would have become suspicious if he’d actually been close enough to see the look on Jack’s face when he arrived. Such an openly joyful and deeply affectionate expression….  
   
Ennis felt a pain in his heart so strong, he nearly doubled over.  
   
Somehow he managed to turn his attention to the brand new Ferguson acquisition, walked with the man over to his car and had a closer look, even checked under the hood, found something nice to say about it.  
   
Then he gave his regards to Mrs. Ferguson, and finally could be on his way.  
   
He got into the truck and hit the gas again. Thinking through the whole conversation, he felt he probably should be fuming fit to be sending up smoke signals, if he’d only had any energy left for it. That Jack fuckin’ Twist! He’d obviously charmed the heck out of Laura Ferguson too, carelessly squandering that sweet melodious voice a his! Crooning to her about wanting to find Ennis. Hoping to find Ennis. Longing to find Ennis. Needing to find Ennis. Christ!  
   
He’d make sure to teach Jack a little lesson on how to put his voice to better use next time they met. Was gonna do his darnedest to make Jack moan and swear and gasp out all those odd little passionate endearments a his. Oh yeah, next time… next time…  
   
Ennis hoped desperately to the Lord above and all good powers everywhere that there would be a next time. Jack did say so right before he left, sure enough, but the desolation, devastation and humiliation he radiated didn’t bode well for their future.  
   
Ennis chewed his nail off his right thumb, not even realizing what he was doing. He spit it impatiently out the truck window. Phew!  
   
If Jack were to cut him off now, if he never came back, if he had had enough, if Ennis wouldn’t be hearing that sweet fine voice a his again, then Ennis’d …. he’d…  
   
He’d lie down and die.  
   
Life without Jack was unthinkable.  
 

   
**The feed store clerk**  
   
Ennis hit the brakes a little too late, going right by the feed store. Shit. He’d promised to pick up those mineral tubs, would have to do it now, or be delayed tomorrow morning.  
   
He had to back up and got out of the truck warily. But he couldn’t see anyone around the place. And Bill at the store was a big, strong, burly guy who rarely spoke more than monosyllables, hardly ever as much as two words in a row. He wouldn’t be going endlessly on about Jack wonderful Twist and his blue eyes and fine smile and his voice and face like a fuckin’ angel’s. Jesus!  
   
Business was winding down for the day, and he’d been right – the place was empty. There weren’t no other customers in the store.  
   
Bill looked up from his usual place behind a counter battered from many long years’ usage and sagging with all sorts of samples stacked high. He acknowledged Ennis’s arrival with a slight nod and a grunt.  
   
Ennis came here fairly often on business for the ranch. He bought supplies for his own horses here too. Nevertheless, somebody witnessing the two of them now would have been hard pressed to realize they’d ever met before.  
   
“Pickin’ up the mineral tubs for the Jansen Ranch,” Ennis said.  
   
“Boss told me they’re ready, can just take them and go.”  
   
Bill gave him another brief nod and rasped out “sure”, got up and signaled for Ennis to follow him into the storage area.  
   
He had the four tubs out in no time. They were too heavy for Ennis to manage on his own, so he helped carry them and load them in the truck one by one, not wasting a single word while doing so.  
   
Ennis breathed a huge sigh of relief as he signed for the tubs.  
   
He could almost have given Bill a manly bear hug, he was that grateful. No more endless yakking about Jack!  
   
“Thank you. You’ll write it on Jansen as usual,” he said, taking his leave with a hand briefly lifted towards his hat, ready to go and get out a there and to finally get himself home.  
   
For the first time Ennis had ever seen, Bill hesitated, looking like there was something on his mind.  
   
Ennis’s heart sank. It wasn’t possible. Not one more!  
   
Bill cleared his throat, taking the daring plunge into actual human speech.  
   
“Uhm….. was a guy in here lookin’ for you,” he said, words coming out of him slowly and reluctantly as if he didn’t quite remember how to form the sounds.  
   
“Friend a yours, he said to me.”  
   
Ennis winced. Oh yes, one more after all. He steeled himself and tried to look indifferent.  
   
“That so?” he muttered.  
   
“Fancy clothes on him, but wore a bullridin’ champion buckle. Saw I’s interested. Wyomin’ man, but he told me he done the circuit down in Texas for years. Won hisself that buckle fair and square. Was happy to tell me ‘bout couple of his rides when I asked. Got trampled once. Had taken his share a beatings, been busted up good. Tough goin’.”  
   
Bill nodded emphatically.  
   
“That guy ain’t no quitter!”  
   
Ennis had been vaguely aware that Bill was interested in the rodeo, had once noticed some old and faded bull-riding photos tacked to a wall somewhere in the store. He had never heard the man talk about it, though. Clearly bull-riding was the one and only key to Bill’s interest, enthusiasm - and to his voice.  
   
And a course, Jack would be the one man to hold the key and to know exactly how to use it. Was just like him.  
   
It gave Ennis a sudden strange feeling of déjà vu. Jack’d always held the one and only key to Ennis, too.  
   
Bill continued, with a faint air of surprise at himself for having spoken this much.  
   
“Yeah, ridin’ the bulls for a livin’ takes guts. Your friend’s got real big balls!” he concluded approvingly.  
   
Oh yes, Ennis knew that. None better. No, sir. Up close and personal, what a fine and smooth and heavy pair a balls they were, too….. Mmmm…  
   
He snapped out of it.  
   
He was over-tired for sure. Damn Jack for making other guys go thinking on his balls and mentioning them right out loud. Figuratively speaking or not made no difference. The size a Jack’s balls was nobody’s business but Ennis’s. And dangerous territory. Alarms were once more going off in his mind.  
   
What if Bill put two and two balls together?  
   
“Guess you're right. He was bull-ridin’ a long time ago, though. He’s in farm machines now,” Ennis offered.  
   
Bill actually smiled.  
   
”I know. Gave me his card. We’re almost in the same business, never know when you need a tractor, he said to me. Guess it was a joke. Happy sort a guy.”  
   
Ennis was aghast. Had Jack carelessly aimed to alert every single person in town to his presence, his plans and his past? Enchanting Bill with his bull-riding stories, turning him into a talking, smiling human being! And... handing out his card? His fuckin’ card!  
   
Did the whole world need to know their business? Even Ennis didn’t keep Jack’s card anywhere!  
   
He muttered a concluding word or two to Bill, something about bull-riding, and got himself out a there.  
   
Damn Jack, that handsome son of a bitch! Why hadn’t he ever given Ennis his card?  
   
Ennis felt strangely sore and disgruntled. 

He’d have liked to have that card. 

 

 **The waitress**  
   
What a horrible day.  
   
Ennis was so exhausted, he could hardly stand.  
   
The voices of everyone he’d met today kept echoing in his mind, clamoring for attention, reminding him of happy, cheerful, handsome Jack – the Jack he himself had rejected and sent packing.  
   
He realized he needed a drink, and badly.  
   
He didn’t have more at home, had cleaned it all out to the very last drop yesterday. His usual haunt, the Black and Blue Eagle Bar, was just a couple a blocks over. One good shot a whiskey, or two, or possibly three, would help cure this persistent noise in his head and dull the damnable ache in his heart.  
   
Did he risk meeting even more people who’d be buttonholing him to yodel Jack Twist’s praises? He pondered that for a second, but decided to take the chance.  
   
He needed that drink more than anything in the world. Didn’t think there were more people around all a Riverton that knew him, anyway. Far as he could figure out he’d already met the lot.  
   
Decision made, he drove straight there.  
   
Never had any man more desperately longed for the calming lull of liquor.  
   
The dim interior of the Eagle Bar revealed a couple of listless patrons sitting around nursing their beer bottles, but no-one he knew enough to talk to, thank the Lord. He hardly paid the man behind the bar a single glance, nor the waitress when he walked right by her, though he’d probably seen her before. He wasn’t in the habit of noticing strange women, anyway. Certainly not when he was in the very serious business of drinking to drown Jack-related doubts and regrets.  
   
The bartender put the whiskey in front of him, deep amber calling to his very soul. Salvation and oblivion in liquid form. Ennis collapsed at the nearest table and lifted the glass.  
   
The waitress had moved closer. Now she tapped his arm and leaned forward towards him.  
   
“You’re Ennis del Mar, now ain’t you?” she asked.  
   
He bit back a groan of desperation.  
   
“Uh-huh”, he said, looking at her for the first time.  
   
Nice-looking gal, long hair in big waves, short skirt, a bright tube top doing its very best to not conceal a right fine pair a boobs. Her face carefully painted, but she hadn’t overdone the make-up. Seemed she had spent time making sure she looked her very best.  
   
“Friend a yours was in here the other day, askin' for directions to your place,” she continued.  
   
Ennis found he was getting used to this line by now, he didn’t even wince when he heard it.  
   
“A very good-lookin' guy. Downright gorgeous, if you know what I mean. Don’t get many a his kind in here. Kind of guy a woman could fall for, and hard.”  
   
She sat down uninvited, leaned her head on her hand, and stared into the distance right past Ennis.  
   
“Ring on his finger. Married, of course…. They always are. They’re always taken. There’s always a past. Hope that wife a his takes care a him good, or she’s gonna lose him, and fast.”  
   
She nodded to herself and sighed.  
   
“Oh my, he’s got to have them linin' up outside the door and all the way down the street! Stands to reason he left just as soon as he appeared.”  
   
She laughed, a brittle little sound, shook her head to send her shiny hair bouncing on her shoulders.   
   
“Guys like that never hang around. All you get is one good look, enough to get you interested in learnin’ more, makin’ you want to move closer, and wooosh! Gone in a flash. Story a my life.”  
   
Ennis practically gnashed his teeth. His temper flared and he glared at her ominously.  
   
“Nope, he’s the story a my life, lady. He’s mine! No-one’s gonna be linin’ up here - except me. Back off!” he thought to himself angrily.  
   
She stared at him, wide-eyed, intent, looking surprised. Questions were  blooming in her eyes now, but she didn’t immediately speak up. Was she waiting for something?  
   
He felt a surge of pure panic. Had he by any chance spoken his thoughts aloud? Oh Christ, he had said it out loud! Hadn’t he? Maybe he’d only mumbled? Shit, he wasn’t sure. He was so tired. Jesus.  
   
He needed to get out a there fast, faster than the fire and brimstone crowd would see guys like him and Jack land in hell, if they’d known about them. And they would get to know, if she’d heard him, and if she cared enough to pass it on.  
   
He threw back his whiskey in a huge frantic gulp that made him cough and sputter, blazing its fiery way down to his guts. Gave him tears in his eyes. Damn.   
   
He slammed the glass and the money down next to each other on the table, a big tip for her, more’n he could afford, and got up to leave. His head was spinning. Everything looked slightly blurred.     
   
The woman didn’t flinch though. The bar saw a rowdy clientele at the best of days. She kept looking at him, expression turning wistful, and chased her previous comment with a plaintive question.  
   
“Don’t suppose he’ll be stayin’ around, don’t suppose he’ll be back?”  
   
“Nope. He’s not comin’ back. Gone for good,” Ennis muttered morosely.  
   
“And I hafta be goin’ to. Was nice talkin’ to you.”  
   
The lie of the century right there. Perhaps she was easily fooled. He could only hope.  
   
Pulling his hat firmly back down over his eyes he slammed out the door in such a hurry that he nearly barreled right through it, wood and glass and all.  
   
He got to the truck and threw himself in, realizing that his eyes were still blurry. The effect of that whiskey cough was damnably difficult to shake. He drew a heavy arm across his face, raking fresh moisture out of his eyes, and leaned back tiredly in his seat.  
   
That one shot a whiskey had come at too high a price.  
 

   
**The liquor store manager**  
   
Back when Ennis moved out St. Stephens way, right before the round-up, he’d thought it just as well not to go telling every Tom, Dick and Harry his business and his whereabouts. Folks didn’t need to know, had no call sticking their noses into his affairs. Keeping his new place private had made him feel safe, feel protected and invisible. But shit - if everyone had known where he lived, Jack would a found out easily, wouldn’t have needed to rush around town, showing himself off, impressing everyone, letting them know how much he was wanting to get a hold of Ennis.  
   
Ennis moaned. Goddamn it. He couldn’t have known Jack would be so fucking stupid, but even so…. Now he regretted his own dumb-ass secrecy.  
   
The prospect of getting home to that lonely secret and sorry place wasn’t appealing. It was downright frightening.  
   
He still needed something strong to fortify himself first.  
   
If he couldn’t stay at the bar to bolster his defenses against sorrows and regrets, he figured the liquor store for his next destination. If he got a move on he could just about manage to get there before closing time.  
   
Jack had probably been there too, he thought bleakly. It seemed he hadn’t left a stone in Riverton unturned in his quest for Ennis del Mar.  
   
But no matter. Ennis was getting used to Jack being mentioned around town.  
   
He needed a bottle, or two or three. He could take one more tale a Jack free with his purchase. One more person singing Jack’s praises would make no big difference now.  
   
With jaws clenched and eyes burning he got the truck in gear and got going. Action was required here.  
   
He pulled up outside the store, tires squealing.  
   
“Gimme two – no, make that tree bottles of Old Rose,” he told Mr. Tallis behind the counter without preamble.  
   
“Figure I’ll stock me up some a those.”  
   
Now who was he fooling? Jason Tallis probably had heard such lines every day of his long liquor-selling life. The store manager didn’t comment though. Keeping on good terms with customers and pretending to believe their self-delusional tall tales and white lies kept him in business, after all.  
   
He had the bottles down in no time, put them in a paper bag, pushed it over the counter.  
   
“Here ya go, del Mar. Your regular fuel, ain’t it? That’ll be….”  
   
Looking at the figures punched into the registry, Ennis nearly heaved a sigh. He shouldn’t be spending money on this. Especially when he somehow thought he remembered that he’d maybe promised the girls to buy a bike next time they visited.  
   
Even so, he paid without the slightest hesitation.  
   
“Guess you got used to a better brand over the weekend, now didn’t ya?” Tallis nodded at him knowingly as he accepted the cash.  
   
“Hunh?”  
   
“The guy who was in here buyin’ a bottle a Chivas Regal, didn’t he share it with you after all? Wasn’t he the fishin’ buddy you’ve been sharin’ all a those bottles a Old Rose with? I figured as much when he asked for directions to your place.”  
   
“Yeah. Well, yeah, that was him. Didn’t come up here to fish. Was just passin’ through.”  
   
“A real connoisseur, if I may say so.”  
   
“Hunh?”  
   
Ennis felt like he was drowing in unwanted details and strange words. All about Jack, always Jack. Hell, all he wanted was to get blindingly drunk like any honest working man. He sure was being punished for planning to go off the straight and narrow, though…  
   
“Guy knew his way around the good and rare brands, is what I’m sayin'. Told me he’d brought along a bottle from Texas but wanted something better. We had ourselves a little discussion, he listened to my recommendation too. Gift for a close friend, so he said – for you, was what I gathered.”  
   
“Uhm....”  
   
God damn it all to Brokeback and back. Ennis felt so miserable and frustrated, so angry and desperate, so outraged and sorry, he couldn’t decide which. But misery won.  
   
Jack had bought a quality bottle for him, for them.  
   
He’d looked so happy, had been planning and dreaming all those many miles and long hours on the road from Childress. Probably planning on them sharing his whiskey, getting them good and ready for going a damn fine and satisfying round in bed. Yeah, sure he’d been thinking on that. Wasn't he moving in for a kiss right there outside, if Ennis hadn’t stopped him?  
   
Right in front of the girls!  
   
But Jack had looked so full a joy, so intensely happy. Like he’d won the big state lottery, and Ennis was the first prize.  
   
And he’d had that expensive bottle ready and waiting in the truck.  
   
Shit.  
   
Ennis wondered what Jack had done with it. He felt the cold dread of anxiety seeping through to the marrow of his bones and gripping his heart.  
   
What if Jack had opened it while driving back home, exhausted and dejected as he was? What if he’d got himself good and drunk, just the same as Ennis had? What if he’d been too drunk to drive properly, maybe he’d gone right off the road somewhere? 

What if he was lying dead in a ditch, and it was Ennis’s fault, all his fault, for sending Jack away in such despair?  
   
Dead in a ditch. That very worst of endings, the ending he’d always feared for Jack – always. He’d told himself it would never happen as long as he continued to hold Jack at a safe distance, as long as they only met a few brief times a year out in the middle a nowhere. No sweet life for them, no way. It was too dangerous.  
   
Had all his efforts been in vain, was fate right now thumbing its nose mockingly at him from a lonely roadside trench somewhere?  
   
Ennis groaned.  
   
Tallis stared at him, looking slightly surprised and worried. He wasn’t used to Ennis looking like death warmed over while mumbling and moaning to himself.  
   
“Don’t let me keep you, del Mar. Your friend ain’t none a my business. Sorry I brought it up.”  
   
Walking back to the truck, Ennis held on to his bag a bottles like a drowning man grips the unexpected rescue rope in a hurricane. Now he was going home, home, home, to somehow soothe – no, submerge - his frantic fears and vivid worries.  
   
A horrible hollow feeling had been growing in him all day. It had been getting more noticeable with every new person reminding him of all that Jack was, all that he could be for Ennis. All that Jack’d wanted for the both a them together.  
   
All that Ennis was too afraid to accept.  
   
Jack filled a big part of Ennis’s world. He left an equally yawning void when he wasn’t there. Normally, Ennis managed to balance blindfolded on the edge, unwilling to acknowledge the steep precipice in front of him. Now he had stumbled and fallen, was hanging on with frantic fingernails over that frightening drop.  
   
The whiskey could dull his guilt and fears for a while, but in the long run the truth would out. Without Jack in his life, it would all be useless. That emptiness could never be filled, no matter how much liquor he poured into it.  
   
His tired mind struggled with such unwelcome and painful thoughts and insights. But a whole life’s experience in keeping his true self at bay and his emotions under wraps hadn’t been completely undone yet. Somehow he pushed the inner turmoil back just enough to manage his vestige of an everyday life and the minimum of mundane tasks required to get him back home.  
   
That had to be how come he realized that something in the truck beside his hollow self was bordering on empty.  
   
The gas gauge arrow on his beat-up dashboard hovered ominously right next to the “E”. If he wanted to get himself home at last, he’d have to tank up first.  
   
 

 **The gas station attendant**  
   
Ennis groaned in despair. The way things had been going, this probably meant he’d have to deal with at least one more nosy and talkative person. Looking on the bright side though, he wouldn’t have to get out of the car.  
   
He took a sharp turn right and pulled up at the Riverton Amoco, his usual stop for gas since he moved from the old apartment.  
   
There were no other cars at the pumps. The attendant sauntered over, taking his time. Ennis had every opportunity to study his approach in the rear view mirror.  
   
Gary was the regular attendant. Ennis knew a bit about him, knew he’d had to quit High School three years ago for some reason and didn’t seem to be going anywhere. He always made Ennis feel vaguely uncomfortable, though he would be damned if he knew why. Gary was reasonably smart, got the job done and seemed a steady worker.  
   
He was nice enough looking, too. Always kept his sleeves rolled up to put his muscled arms on display, and usually had the top of his overalls open to show a little bit a chest as well. Ennis figured Gary wanted to impress the girls. He was the right age for it, and he sure had the looks, with that bright smile a his and the wavy, dark hair.  
   
Nevertheless there always was a faint whiff of challenge and menace around Gary. Ennis couldn’t rightly put his finger on what caused it, since the young man never did or said anything stupid or offensive. He figured that if Gary ever actually did get out of line, he’d be able to teach him a lesson and put him in his place without much difficulty.  
   
He’d left it at that, but his unease remained.  
   
That way a walking. The arms covered in motor oil and lube stains. The open and direct stare. Yeah, Ennis didn’t like it.  
   
This time wasn’t any different – if anything, that hint a something was stronger than before. Ennis wasn’t in no mood to think about it though. Christ, he had enough problems on his mind already to last him many a long lifetime!  
   
He ducked his head, his eyes skittering quickly from the mirror to lock onto a small clump of tumbleweed lodged near one a the gas pumps. Interesting sort of tumbleweed. He stared at it intently, blocking out all other thoughts, worries, impressions and views.  
   
Gary leaned down to the open window with that knowing half-smile a his, a thin dark streak accenting his right cheek where he’d just dried off the sweat with his hand.  
   
He waited till Ennis had to turn towards him.

“So, Mr. del Mar, what do you want from me today?” he said evenly. He looked Ennis straight in the eye, and his enigmatic and mischievous smile increased another fraction.  
   
Ennis squirmed. He felt more uncomfortable than ever. He didn’t feel up to dealing with one more inquisitive person invading his private space today, and that was a fact.  
   
Why couldn’t they all just pretend he was invisible?  
   
“Fill it up regular,” he mumbled out the window, and ducked his head back away from the light of day. What would he ever have done without the invention of the hat brim?  
   
Gary stood still for a moment, as if waiting for something more. Then “sure enough”, he replied every bit as evenly as before, and turned to the pump.  
   
Unlike most times, he continued talking while gassing up the truck.  
   
Raising his voice enough so that Ennis couldn’t pretend not to hear him over the hum of the pump, he confirmed what Ennis had suspected: Jack had been here, too.  
   
“Say, Mr. del Mar, a friend a yours was in here the other day, askin’ for directions to your place. Told me he’d already asked a whole heap a other folks, but none a them knew to tell him. You’re real good at keepin’ secrets, ain’t you?”  
   
Gary paused a moment, hands steady on the pump, eyes steady on Ennis, and continued with more than a little laughter in his voice:  
   
“Good thing I know ‘xactly where you’re stayin’ now. I’ve made a point a keepin’ track a that, just in case. Could tell him just where he needed to go.”  
   
Surprised and alarmed, Ennis forgot to keep his eyes private, and met Gary’s stare in the mirror. The laughter was there, and the challenge, and something else, a realization that suddenly at long last hit Ennis like a hammer to the forehead.  
   
Shit. How come he’d never realized this before? And how come he had to realize it today, of all horrible days?  
   
Gary was…. Gary was …… could he actually be like him and Jack? Or worse, could he even be one a those – one a those queers? If he was, he evidently was much less cautious than he ought to be.  
   
Ennis winced.  
   
Christ. Could it be true? Was Gary…. coming on to him? Or was he just imagining things? This development seemed impossible, far too strange to be real. Fuck it, his mind had to be playing another weird trick on him, and not for the first time today. Was he losing it at last?    
   
Nervously he peeked in the mirror again.  
   
Gary was finishing up with the pump, but he still met Ennis’s eyes right on.  
   
He grinned.  
   
And then he winked.

At any other time, Ennis would have been out of the truck in a blink.  
   
Furious and frightened, he’d a punched Gary’s lights right out, probably beat him to a pulp, but now he was too tired.  
   
He felt like all the layers protecting his innermost core had been peeled off today, one by one, slowly and surely as words and miles and hours ticked by. The hidden center a his being, the one he’d never revealed to anyone but Jack, and only on few and very rare occasions at that: Here was the last concealing layer coming off, the big secret casually revealed by this…. boy. A mere boy!  
   
Was he that transparent? Had he always been? Despite his every self-denying effort to be a responsible straight-laced family man and to keep Jack and all that Jack meant to him at bay?  
   
“This happen to other people?” he remembered asking Jack once in despair and confusion. “What the hell do they do?”  
   
“It don’t happen here and if it does, I don’t know what – maybe they go to Denver,” Jack had answered in a huff, annoyed and disappointed with Ennis for refusing the sweet life with him, even back then.  
   
Well, Jack had been wrong, and so had he.  
   
It did happen to other people, right here in Riverton, and when it did they clearly didn’t all go off to Denver. Ennis felt like he’d just had a big revelation, unexpected as it was. Gary had stayed right here. Had stayed, and was doing fine, far as Ennis could judge. He wasn’t afraid to live.  
   
And where there’s one, there clearly could be more.  
   
Embarrassed and weary, he made himself look up at Gary as he came to take the cash. Completely out of his depth, Ennis tried his darnedest to just look non-committal. Non-comprehensive. Just a regular Joe filling up the tank, oblivious to the sweaty skin and knowing grin and all Gary’s broad hints and innuendo.  
   
Gary’s face fell a little. A small frown crossed his features – and was gone. He changed his approach.  
   
“Very nice man, that Jack Twist. I liked him a lot,” he decreed.  
   
Ennis bit his lip. Christ, he wanted that drink! Courageously he met Gary’s eyes again and reckoned that his own couldn’t hide the truth any more.  
   
“That so?” he asked, and shocked himself by adding ”How come?”  
   
Gary looked surprised, his eyes going wide. His smile returned. Pressing the perceived advantage, he slowly handed Ennis his change, stepping right up to the car and lowering his voice conspiratorially.  
   
“Such a charmin’ and good-lookin’ guy. Kind a look makes a man stand up and pay attention. If you don’t mind me sayin’ so, that tongue a his, peekin’ out like that…. M-hmm... yeah. Mighty distractin’. Spent the weekend, did he? I’d fill his tank up any time and gladly, that’s God’s own truth and I told him as much!”  
   
He shook his head in bemused regret.  
   
“A course, he only laughed at me. Flattered, but no chance in hell, he told me. Guess he had better prospects, huh? Can’t say I disagree with him there.”  
   
Eyes glinting, Gary shrugged, grinned and boldly met Ennis’s stare. One a his eyebrows arched quizzically.  
   
“Worth the try, though. Yeah, the both a you surely are.”  
   
Ennis took in Gary’s provocative statements and open invitation, his entire field of vision filled with the admittedly tempting sight a that young, healthy available body and those glittering eyes.  
   
Being unexpectedly exposed for who he really was hadn’t riled Ennis, as worn-out and shell-shocked as he already was. After all, Gary was more or less in the same boat. He would have to keep his mouth shut. And all this other strangeness just seemed to follow from there.  
   
It was Gary’s comments about Jack that finally and violently triggered Ennis’s startling point. His thoughts careened frantically as harsh possessive anger exploded to the surface a his mind.  
   
Wild jealousy reared its ugly, snarling head.  
   
Gary was standing right there, fucking teasing him, telling him he had been coming on to Jack! And even if Jack had declined and laughed it off while on his merry way to Ennis, who was to say what could happen now? If there were other smoking hot guys with sweaty skin, oil smudges and open overalls around, who was to say Jack wouldn’t be tempted to take up with one a them, now Ennis had refused him so cruelly? Ennis, who hadn’t even wanted to kiss him once?  
   
When Ennis couldn’t get his act together better than this, why would Jack want to stay true?  
   
Christ. How many times would Jack be filling gas, just on his round-trip between Childress and Riverton? He could so easily be enticed into a back room somewhere, doing unspeakable things with some good-looking well-muscled attendant hunk at this very moment!  
   
Ennis wanted to cry. The images his brain was unexpectedly throwing at him were completely nightmarish in all their lustful, sinful, sweaty abandon. Not his Jack! No way! No, no, never!  
   
Glaring evilly at Gary as if the young man was the combined sinful son of Satan and the Angel of Death in one and the same body, Ennis abruptly hit the gas without further ado and got himself out a there like a bat out a hell.  
   
Gary was left standing in the cloud a dust, shaking his head in dismay. Son of a bitch! And here he had finally been making some real progress!  
   
Ennis on his part had never been closer to panicking. Someone had seen clear through to his shameful secret. That was bad enough, but somehow it wasn’t the worst that could happen any more. He’d always lulled himself into the belief that he and Jack were on their own. Now he suddenly realized temptations lurked everywhere, in every burger joint and hotel bar and truck stop along the way.  
   
And he’d just given Jack a firm shove in that direction, given him the strongest incentive in the world to want to forget his sadness and sorrows for a while in the strong open arms of some shirtless, eager guy with a knowing smile and a frank stare and a fine young body. And a big, hard….  
   
God damn it!  
   
Ennis swore with a vengeance.  
   
He didn’t deserve anything else, did he? He’d practically sent Jack off like he was the shit under Ennis’s shoes. What right had he to demand anything better from Jack in return?  
   
Hadn’t he practically driven Jack to seek solace with some leering, lusting stranger?  
 

   
**The ranch owner**  
   
With dread on his mind and a leaden heart, Ennis arrived home to park his truck in its usual place. He stumbled to the door. Now that he was finally home, he couldn’t face going into those small, spare, lonely rooms, however much they offered solitude and silence.  
   
He’d not be able to breathe in there!  
   
Listlessly he dropped down on the roughly hewn plank serving him as a sort a bench along the front a his miserable abode. He had his bottle, and perfect peace and quiet, and open air at last.  
   
“Be careful what you wish for”, he thought bleakly to himself in a rare instance of self-irony.  
   
He pulled out a packet a smokes, lit one up and tipped his head back against the wall. He closed his eyes, pulled smoke deep into his lungs and felt his thoughts go thankfully, blissfully blank from pure emotional overload. His body slumped against the wall just as his mind sagged from the sheer weight of the thoughts and realizations it had been forced to manage today.  
   
What a day! What a horrible, god-damn-it-all-five-ways-to-hell-and-back-again day!  
   
Too soon all the smokes were history and he felt the evening chill forcing its way through his stupor, making him sit up and pay some attention. He was freezing. Icy cold seemed to radiate in shivers from his very core. He couldn’t be bothered to get up, but he had the next remedy ready.  
   
He opened his bottle and pulled on it deeply, once, twice – and again. The fire it ignited felt like heaven. The sudden warmth racing along his veins and nerves promised his mind complete oblivion. Gratefully he lifted the bottle again for another long pull.  
   
Head lolling tiredly back against the wall, eyes at half mast, he suddenly was aware of a shape moving up the road towards him in the gathering dusk. A human form, hobbling along, slowly and torturously. Someone – or something – was approaching.  
   
All at once dread and terror gripped his heart.  
   
A ghost! The ghost of a crippled and wounded Jack, struggling back to warn him of the horrible fate that had befallen him – a fate that was Ennis’s doing and that he would never, ever be allowed to make amends for or to forget…..!  
   
He stared at the approaching shape and shook his head, clearing his mind of such panicked fantasies. It wasn’t Jack. It was Mr. McKernan, his ranch owner landlord, hobbling along on his cane.  
   
Ennis sighed with relief. His worn-out heart couldn’t take much more.  
   
His landlord was probably coming around to collect the rent. Was the rent due today? Did he have enough money? Ennis couldn’t remember. And he couldn’t be bothered to get up to go check. He’d let the man tell him his errand first. He leaned his head on the wall and closed his eyes, and didn’t as much as blink again until the plank groaned under the additional weight of Mr. McKernan as the elderly man sat down and breathed out.  
   
Ennis nodded in his general direction.  
   
“Howdy,” he mumbled miserably.  
   
“Tolerable evenin’ tonight,” McKernan responded. “Not too chilly. My joints can’t take the cold well anymore. Those damnable damages from my early years of marriage, those crazy days of weekend rodeoin’ to make ends meet somehow and keep a roof over our heads…  it’s just keep gettin’ worse with the cold. Arthritis and all. The pain is bad.”  
   
Ennis nodded. There was a beat of silence.  
   
McKernan cleared his throat.  
   
Ennis realized what was coming, and felt surprisingly at peace with it. He even felt comfortable forestalling it.  
   
“Maybe you met my friend Jack the other day, comin’ this way to see me?” he asked. “Jack used a ride the bulls too, got pretty busted up from it, like you. Did the circuit down in Texas for years.”  
   
“Yes. Yeah, I met him right down by the fence, driving up this way to see you. I noticed his buckle, but I didn’t know the rest a it. He just stopped to confirm he was steering the right course. Seemed like a fine guy. A good man.”  
   
“Yes,” Ennis agreed quietly. “Jack is a good man. The best.”  
   
McKernan leaned forward, scrutinizing Ennis in the gathering dusk.  
   
“And yet I thought I saw him drivin’ away again right down this here road just a couple a minutes later?”  
   
“Yeah,” Ennis whispered.  
   
McKernan was silent. He adjusted his legs and his grip on his cane, sighed, and stared into the oncoming night.  
   
“I’ve got lots a time to think,” he said at last. “After my Elisa passed away and Peter took over runnin’ the ranch, enough time is all that I have now. Guess that’s a part a gettin’ older. Lookin’ back on life and thinkin’ about how things were and how they could a been. Thinkin’ on what really mattered.”  
   
He paused, lost in thought for a moment.  
   
“Meetin’ your friend brought Lisa back to me,” he continued. He chuckled self-deprecatingly. “But then, nearly everything brings Lisa back to me, sure enough.”  
   
Ennis knew that Elisa – Lisa - was the late Mrs. McKernan. He’d never met her, she’d been dead these many years, but McKernan kept referring to her as if she’d just momentarily stepped out to the grocery store for a pound a coffee and some beans.  
   
“Lisa and me….. I guess we were meant to be, like the sayin’ goes. Loved her from the first time I saw her. But I was young and impressionable. And my folks didn’t think Lisa was good enough for me. The ranch still exists, it’s one a the biggest in the state. I was gonna take it over, was gonna make them proud and amount to something big, and she…. Well, my ma called her “poor trash” to my face. Wouldn’t stop naggin’ me about lookin’ for someone else. Somebody more fittin’, someone with class and style and an inheritance to go with it. Kept harpin’ on my duties and my prospects and all that, how Lisa would drag me down. Very concerned about what other people would think and say about the family, was my ma. Most important thing to her. So at last I gave in. Told Lisa we were through.”  
   
He shook his head, remembering.  
   
“She left and found herself work outside a Laramie, tending house for a couple a old geezers. I stayed on with the family, doin’ my duty. Livin’ up to my folks’ expectations. Spent year after sorry year lookin’ for someone better and knowin’ there wouldn’t be none, regrettin’ it every day that Lisa wasn’t by my side. Feelin’ empty. I was bein’ too proud and too scared to seek her out. Figured even if I found her, she wouldn’t wanna take me back, way I’d treated her.”  
   
He sighed again, once more carefully changing the position of his aching legs.  
   
Ennis looked at him in the gathering darkness of upcoming nigh, couldn’t see his expression clearly, but heard how thick McKernan’s voice had become. He felt both moved and embarrassed at this surprisingly personal confession from a man he hardly knew enough to talk to, except when it came to exchanging comments about the weather.  
   
“When I finally went lookin’ for her…. When I finally found her, and told her how I felt about her, and asked her to forgive me…. That was the happiest day in my life. That very  day my folks disinherited me, made me and Lisa start over with empty hands. But from then on we had each other, and we were the fortunate ones. We built this little place together. I never looked back.”  
   
He paused for a moment, glanced at Ennis.  
   
“The look on Lisa’s face when she told me “yes” that day – I would recognize that look anywhere. I’ll never forget it. I know I’ll get to see it when she and I meet again one a these days.”  
   
Drawing a deep breath, he concluded his lengthy reminiscing with a simple statement.  
   
“And I saw a look just like that two days ago, on your friend’s face when I met him here, comin’ to see you.”  
   
Ennis was stunned. He hadn’t expected this. This day had been so full of revelations, he felt nothing could surprise him anymore. He listened with every part of his being, but kept silent.  
   
McKernan cleared his throat.  
   
“Lisa saw into the hearts a folks. She saw past convention and customs and fine airs to what’s important. She looked to the soul. Found good in most one and all, helped them out, kept wishin’ for everyone to be happy like us. The hide may be scarred, but the heart is what counts, she always kept remindin’ me. And she always was right, was my Lisa.”  
   
The older man considered his tale, nodded to himself and reached out, touching Ennis’s shoulder for a brief moment.  
   
“None a my business, a course. But if you feel like goin’ after that friend a yours, if you’ve got something to tell him, then I can have Peter’s boy Billy take care a your horses a few days. You just let me know.”  
   
Ennis was completely and utterly speechless.  
   
McKernan sighed again.  
   
“Guess that was all I wanted to say to you, del Mar. What Lisa would a told you. Don’t you go repeatin’ old errors, now. You’ll regret it every lonely day a your life.”  
   
He rose from the bench, his joints creaking audibly.  
   
”You take your time and think it through.”  
   
He took his leave. Slowly and painfully he started down the road again, refusing Ennis’s belated offer to drive him home. He needed the movement and exercise, he insisted. He could take his time. Time was all he had now.  
 

   
**Reflection**  
   
Ennis was left alone. Dark night set in. Whiskey or no, he was chilled to the bone.  
   
Thoughts, images and impressions coursed through his mind.  
   
Jack. Handsome, open, charming and cheerful. Those eyes, and that smile, and the way his body felt to the touch, hard and soft…. His lips when they met Ennis’s own… Passionate, affectionate, exciting and full of life. In every situation, but certainly in bed – Ennis felt heat rise in his cheeks to think on that, but couldn’t deny this most obvious truth to himself.  
   
Jack. Eternally hopeful, trusting and true. Oh, he could keep on piling up words, and mean every one, but the sum of all was that there wasn’t anyone else on earth even remotely as good and fine and fascinating.  
   
Between the ten a them, these folks he’d talked to today had managed to remind him of how incredibly much there was to cherish about Jack.  
   
And they hadn’t been suspicious about Jack’s visiting Ennis.  
   
But what if they’d known…..?  
   
Somehow he couldn’t wrap his mind around the image a these people forming a violent mob, tar and feathers and tire irons on high, coming for Jack and him.  
   
Jack had made a strong impression on all a them. Young and old, men and women, that didn’t make no difference. They had all been charmed. In one way or the other, they genuinely admired Jack. In fact, some a them liked him way too much, damn it. That Gary had better keep his oily paws to himself! 

But every single one a them had been interested and impressed.  
   
Maybe they even liked him too? Ennis had never even considered that. He’d always figured everyone liked him every bit as little as he liked himself.  
   
He knew his own dad would have laughed at him mockingly, would have called him and Jack abominations, would have fetched the tire iron himself to prove his point, but…. Why, Mr. McKernan belonged to his dad’s generation. Was older than his dad, in fact. And he’d come up here to tell Ennis to get a move on in Jack’s direction, with his blessing!  
   
Ennis simply couldn’t rightly see any a the folks he’d met sharing his dad’s bitter scorn and vile hatred. Couldn’t see any a them being willing to act on it, anyhow. Even if Jack and he were….together. Even if people found out about it.  
   
The horrific image of Earl’s mutilated body was fading into the mist of things past. That nightmarish mental image had finally been replaced with its exact opposite, reinforced in Ennis's mind by everyone he’d met: A happy and hopeful Jack Twist – vibrant and very much alive.  
   
From their first days together, Jack himself inexplicably had wanted nothing more than to let Ennis share in all that he had to give, every single day and night, if Ennis’d only let him. But sorry dumb-ass that he was, he’d kept telling Jack “no” and had turned him away, full of fear and shame!  
   
“There ain’t no reins on this one”, Ennis had once told Jack and meant it. But ever after, he’d done nothing except strive to rein it in, to hobble it, to muzzle it and cage it in the dark.  
   
This day’s ordeals had made him realize that in doing so, he might actually be putting Jack at greater risk. Jack could be driven to do something risky and dangerous in despair. Right now, or every new day. Could Ennis ever allow himself a calm moment if Jack wasn’t safely by his side?  
   
Or - horror of fuckin’ horrors – Jack might decide to finally give up on Ennis after this latest fiasco and find someone else, somebody who was more than willing and ready and waiting out there in the dark. Ennis didn’t think his heart could hurt any worse than at this painful and dreadful scenario.  
   
Over and again, he had learned today that he couldn’t live without Jack.  
   
He just couldn’t stand this anymore.  
   
Everyone who’d met Jack had evidently fallen head over heels for him. Everyone enthusiastically sang his praises. Why should Ennis be the only one who didn’t join the chorus? Why should he be the one to pretend indifference and to hide his feelings, at such immense personal cost to the both a them?  
   
He closed his eyes, let his head drop back against the wall behind him, and drew a deep breath.  
   
No reason. There was no reason. Not after today.  
   
Jack wasn’t no shameful, dirty secret to be kept at arm’s length - he was the best thing a Ennis’s life.  
   
He looked at the one strong word in his mind and felt that it held the truth.   
   
He desperately needed to see Jack, tell Jack all a this, to grab him and hold on to him and kiss him to within the barest inch a his life.  
   
Tomorrow he’d ask McKernan to look after his horses, ask boss Jansen for some days off, would aim to travel out a Wyoming for the first time in his life.  
   
No use sitting around planning and hoping and wishing and dreaming.  
   
Another phone call would never do. Jack would just laugh at him, would hang up on him or tell him to fuck off, would never believe it. Jack had been hurt too much. Jack had left Riverton without hope.  
   
Ennis was the one with something to prove, here.  
   
Sure it would be tough, sure it would be a goddamn struggle sometimes, sure they would always have to be cautious and careful to keep it on the QT, no need to tell the world their business. But they’d have each other. Ennis desperately hoped and prayed it wasn’t too late.  
   
He had no idea whether his miserable truck could manage the long miles down to Childress, Texas. But tomorrow he intended to find out.  
   
 

 **Epilogue**  
   
The truck sputtered, coughed and died with a groan. Ennis wasn’t sure he would ever be able to bring the wheezing motor back to life again. Somehow he had coaxed his tired old truck to keep going all the many miles down to Childress, though – and that was enough for now.  
   
In the early morning light he looked up at the Newsome Farm Equipment sign, flashing a bright red, white and blue. “Quality – reliability – service” the sign declared proudly to the world.  
   
The dealership looked impressive, big, and orderly. Lots of colorful flags fluttered on the morning breeze. A huge crimson combine and several smaller tractors were parked outside in the exhibit area.  
   
The very first man he stopped to ask had been able to give him exact directions. Clearly Newsome’s was well known around town. It looked like a profitable and prosperous place. Ennis felt ragged and poor in comparison.  
   
He waited nervously in his truck, fidgeting and biting his nails to the quick as the street came alive; shops opening, people getting to work, cars arriving at Newsome’s to start the new day.  
   
And there it was, the car he’d been waiting for. Ennis was flooded with immense relief and gratitude. Jack’s blue and white Ford came down the street and made a sharp turn to stop right in front of Newsome’s.  
   
Feeling vaguely like he was gonna throw up, Ennis got out a the truck, his heart beating like a drum, knees wobbly and palms sweating. He had washed some and shaved at a gas station outside a town, but still felt shabby and scruffy. He’d a liked to have been more rested and to have looked his best for this crucial moment.  
   
It could prove the most important a his life.  
   
A woman got out at the passenger side a Jack’s car. Slim and pretty with big fluffy blond hair, wearing a crisp white blouse and an elegant skirt, some sort a jewelry at her throat glinting in the morning sun. Her eyes swept the street, her glance meeting Ennis’s for the briefest of moments before continuing right on. A rumpled man next to a battered old truck held no claim to her attention, didn’t meet the standards of a possible customer, wasn’t someone who could afford even the least expensive tractor.  
   
Ennis felt shaken nevertheless. He’d not planned on getting to see Jack’s wife. Till now she’d largely remained an abstract concept in his mind, if he thought a her at all. It didn’t make him proud to be loitering in the street, planning on stealing her husband away. Taking off permanently with the father a her son.  
   
The woman – Lureen – turned back towards the car. And there was Jack, out a the car, his face shielded by his big hat, his movements somehow sluggish in the early light.  
   
Ennis could have cried and jumped and hollered with relief. He took a couple of involuntary stumbling steps forward, wanting to run, to sprint right over there and grab a hold a Jack, to never let him go.  
   
Drawn by the unusual movement, Jack’s glance swung his way.  
   
Their eyes met, locked, held. It felt as if time stood still. Ennis could a sworn his heart stopped.  
   
Jack broke the connection with a strained little shake a his head. He turned back to Lureen, said something, gestured towards the entrance of the dealership. She replied, and started walking away from the car, Jack’s shaded eyes following her for a moment.  
   
Then he turned back to face Ennis, visibly steeling himself.  
   
Ennis remained rooted to the same spot. His legs wouldn’t – couldn’t – move. His heart thumped painfully as he watched Jack walking towards him with reluctant, heavy steps.  
   
The hope and delight that so recently made Jack float on air were nowhere to be seen.  
   
He stopped right in front of Ennis and didn’t even smile.  
   
Ennis was taken aback at his looks. Jack looked like shit. His face was pale, pinched and drawn, with dark circles like smudges round his eyes. Those eyes looked dull and lifeless now, and his expression was strangely guarded.  
   
Ennis could a wept. The contrast to the Jack who appeared in Riverton last Saturday couldn’t possibly have been any greater.  
   
“Ennis. What are you doin’ here? The Bighorn Mountains ain’t in Texas,” Jack said coldly.  
   
Ennis looked into his eyes, doing his darnedest for once to put his own emotions on open display and to lay bare his heart and trembling soul.  
   
“No, that they ain’t. But you are, Jack.”  
   
Jack looked skeptical, doubtful, and reluctant to get into any a this again, having been burned so badly only a few days ago. He sure wasn’t making this any easier, but Ennis knew well enough he didn’t deserve better. He was on his own here.  
   
“Jack, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. If you can forgive me, bud, I’m hopin’ we can start over. You and me, together - if you’re still willin’. I know it must be hard for you to believe me, believe that I really mean it now, the stubborn son of a bitch that I’ve been, but……”  
   
Jack listened, but didn’t move, didn’t reply. His expression remained blank and his eyes unreadable.  
   
Ennis drew a deep breath. He threw his last card on the table. Win or lose – this was all he had left.  
   
“I love you, Jack.”  
   
If he lived to be a hundred, Ennis knew that he’d never behold a sweeter sight than the tiny little flicker of surprised joy that reappeared deep in Jack’s tired blue eyes, the tentative delight that shaped his lips into the hint of a smile.  
   
Jack shook his head in reluctant wonder and exasperation, reached out a hand to Ennis, and got some few words out inbetween a groan and a sob and a laugh.  
   
“Damn you, Ennis.”  
   
 

**-The end-**


End file.
